The Greatest Kami
by nexus411
Summary: The war between spirits and men that has ravaged the distant plane of Kamigawa is coming to an end, and a single sword will decide the fate of the world of Tarlok Mahoi and Koloki Takasan. Leave in the reviews who should win: Humans or Spirits
1. Tarlok Mahoi

Tarlok Mahoi scaled the last branches of the tree, craning his neck to peer over the top leaves, and silently drew his bowstring back to his cheek. The ogre he had been tracking for the last four days stood slowly, its eyes adjusting to the dawn's early light, and performed a routine stretch. Tarlok paused his inhaling mid-breath and let the arrow fly. As the beast stood up, the arrow caught it in the throat. It sputtered, and collapsed. Tarlok quickly approached and beheaded the ogre, bagging his trophy as he walked back to the Eiganjo palace.

No cheers were prepared for him as he trudged through the dusty roads leading to the imperial sector. No villager dared look him in the eye, dared peer past his dark hood and darker reputation. Many times he heard negative whispers, and he once paused, drew his blade, sheathed it again, and kept walking. He heard no more whispers. One man was foolish enough to try and nick one of his blades from him, and lost three fingers before anyone had even seen him. Anyone but Tarlok.

The palace portcullis rattled open for him, and the guards collected the head as he strode past. The iron gate slammed shut behind him, and a scrawny messenger ran up to Tarlok. "Sir!" shouted the boy. "The master has requested your presence in his chambers!"

"Thank you," mumbled Tarlok. He was grateful that there was at least one man, even if he was a boy, that did not fear him beyond all reason. He tossed the boy a golden coin, and began his climb up the five hundred flights of stairs that led to the sanctum of Konda, Lord of Eiganjo.

He passed many on his way up, but none spoke to him. He had climbed these stairs a thousand times, and was scarcely sweating when he reached the sliding doors of Lord Konda.

"You are not happy," began the ancient samurai, "and yet you have done a great deed. Why do the people not cheer your name in the streets?"

"Because I'm a monster," replied Tarlok solemnly, and he sat down to meditate with the old man.

"No, that," said Konda, pointing out the window where the ogre's head was being held on display, "was a monster. But you killed it. With Hidetsugu gone, the land may prosper once again. His band of ogres will flee Eiganjo and never return, for they were more blind than even he." Konda poured Tarlok a pot of tea, and after taking a first sip, said, "You make a demon out of yourself, and I do not see why."

Tarlok sipped his tea and laid his sword down on the table next to him. "Master, I am an assassin. I kill for a living, and I watch even more the falling outs of my foes beneath my blade."

"Ah, Tarlok," said the old man, rising and folding his hands behind his back. "A samurai is not some dirty thing, tainted with distrust and vile intentions, even if he is an assassin."

Tarlok turned away, pulling his hood back up to hide his face.

"There is no time for remorse, even if it is as needed as yours, Tarlok." Konda stood and looked out the window again, this time into the noon sun. "We have a chance upon us to end the kami war."

Tarlok stood up, spilling his tea in his surprise. "That is impossible, the kami are endless, and move as one. We stand no chance against them unless we can kill O-Kagachi, and he has not come out of hiding since the war began." Tarlok paused, and then whispered, "except at the battle of iron hill." This was the place where an entire army of men had mysteriously disappeared after seeing O-Kagachi rise above them. Tarlok had been there, and he was the only one that the kami had not taken. He had never seen any of the one thousand men again.

"The oracle foretold that the greatest kami would fall under the blade of our greatest warrior." Lord Konda turned about, his robes sweeping a circular pattern over the floor as he faced Tarlok. "O-Kagachi is undoubtedly the greatest spirit in all of Kamigawa, but with your training complete I know that you are now humanity's last hope." He walked across the pristine wooden floor to a dusty old cabinet that Tarlok had never before seen opened, reached into it, and drew from within a radiant sapphire blade.

"Master…" mumbled Tarlok with nearly inaudible volume as he took the blade.

"This is Tatsumasa, the Dragon's Fang. It was destined to end this war, one way or another, from the time it was first crafted. I trust it to your care now, samurai Mahoi, and pray that you are able to kill the great kami before he kills you. Stay safe, stay alert, and whatever happens," said Konda, squinting into his disciple's eyes, "don't let O-Kagachi take it from you."

Tarlok bowed to his master and sheathed the blade, descending the stairs and packing his provisions for the quest. The young messenger who had informed him that Konda wished to seek his audience approached him with a dark, black, hooded cloak that resembled Tarlok's. He had various knives tucked into tiny pockets all over his body, and rode up to the royal assassin on an adolescent pony.

"I'm coming sir!"

Tarlok turned about to see who had claimed such a feat, hoping to see a shaman, or perhaps a spirit that had defected to the human ranks but was met with the beaming hope of the young lad's face. "No," he replied matter-of-factly.

Clearly irked, the boy jumped from his steed and walked quickly to Tarlok's side, tugging on his robe. "Don't you know who I am?"

"No, but you clearly know who I am, so leave me be."

"I am a student of Lord Konda, equal in you to rank, and my sensei has ordered you to take me on the quest with you."

This caught Tarlok's attention. "Why on earth would he do that?" asked the assassin, turning about and staring the lad down with a deep, penetrating gaze.

The boy shrugged as if the fate of his race did not rest in his hands, and replied, "We can always climb five hundred flights of stairs and ask him."

The assassin made a growling noise at the boy, cursing the stairs, and finished packing his things. "We leave now."

"I'm ready."

Tarlok did not like this boy. "If you stand in my way, I will order you back to this palace before you can say Akki."

"I already told you, our ranks are…"

"Rank will have nothing to do with my orders," said Tarlok, and the boy paled. "Obey me, or you will die. It will not come by my hand, but it will come."

The two of them rode out the palace gates with one eager for adventure, and one dying for spirit blood, but both united in their quest to save their land.


	2. Koloki Takasan

The oracle flew softly over the heads of the young spirits, her mystic robes dancing through the air like a sea of butterflies. Koloki Takasan waited eagerly for her to pass, so that his time here may be over. He drifted unknowingly into the kami to the left, who made a grunting noise and shoved Koloki back. He sank through the air a little further, trying to disappear like so many of his kind could do with incredible ease.

The brute next to him snarled and spit the words out slowly, "Filthy genju." Koloki tried again to disappear, but instead a small burst of energy came from him and knocked back the spirit who had insulted him. "You little worm!" he cried, holding the genju into the air.

Koloki screamed, certain that he was in for another beating by the much stronger spirits, but the oracle suddenly cried out "Halt!" and flew to his aid. She snatched him away quickly and flew to a darkened, rune-etched temple without saying another word. She studied him like he was some uncouth experiment, and Koloki noticed five more ancient spirits coming through doors surrounding the temple. "Do you know where you are, genju?" said the oracle. "You have studied enough to know for yourself.

Koloki looked about him, gazing at the shape of the temple. "This is the God's Eye, Gate to the Reikai."

The oracle smiled and nodded, saying this time, "And do you know who they are?"

The young kami stared at the five powerful spirits around him and whispered, "You are the five patrons of Kamigawa." He was astounded. The five patrons were the superheroes of spirits, the ones who the five non-human races of Kamigawa worshipped. There was the patron of the akki, whose goblin children had given him the right and power to burn all beneath his mighty maw; the patron of the kitsune, whose eight arms brought prosperity to the fox people who righteously feared her; the patron of the moon, whose magic powers gained knowledge and power for the cloud dwelling people of the moonfolk; the patron of the nezumi, who brought sorrow and death to those who did not respect her or her rat children; and the patron of the orochi, who brought infinite power to his serpentine kin.

They spoke in unison with a voice of great power, "The oracle has predicted that an end is coming to this war between our world and theirs. This war that has caused so much hate, strife, and utter loss. This war that has brought infinite disaster to our land, and destroyed the hope of a new kami generation." The five patrons stopped to convey images of torn wastelands that they had seen to Koloki's mind. "Our master, O-Kagachi, is coming from his secret location to end this war, but the men of this world have equipped their greatest warrior to slay him. He carries with him the prophesized blade, dragon's fang, and means to slay O-Kagachi when he comes from the Aether to take this earth as his prize." The five stared deeply into the young kami's eyes. "You must not let this happen. We have with us the legendary Jitte of Uzewama. Use it to kill the human warrior, and to save our birthright to total dominion over Kamigawa."

The jitte materialized before Koloki, and he took it with a steady hand. This wand had more power than he would ever know, and he could not help but ask the five, "Why do you choose me? Why am I the one to win our people the battle?" He knelt his head so low that it touched his chest, and whispered, "I am nothing but a genju."

Genju are spirits with unique powers, capable of giving life to the land around them and morphing lifeless objects into powerful monsters, but as history ran on and their numbers dwindled, they became weak next to a new, stronger breed of kami.

"Perhaps you are not one of us," said the oracle. "Perhaps you are a land binder, a dirt lover, and a weak link in the endless chain of command that our people have formed, but you are no ordinary spirit. Soon you will know power beyond your wildest dreams, and the humans will stand no chance. You will be equal to O-Kagachi himself, and none will dare stand in your way." The oracle lifted his head with one misty finger, saying, "You are our only hope."

Suddenly Koloki was thrown from the temple through an endless storm of energy, and onto a path with a powerful blood red kami. All he could do as he looked about him was quietly mumble, "Who are you?"

The thing beside him flooded together its branches and all drops of its liquid form to bring itself a humanoid shape. "I am Mannichi, the Fevered Dream, and you must be the genju who has been given Uzewama's Jitte."

In a barely audible voice Koloki whispered, "I am he."

Mannichi laughed and clapped the genju on the back, resulting in another burst of energy coming from his body. This energy rocked Mannichi back and forth several times, and when he regained his balance he said, "We'll have to learn to harness that now won't we?" with a fatherly smile. He pointed to a gleaming silver portal ahead of him and said in a lecturing voice, "That is the gateway to the mortal world. Beyond there all freedom of flight that you might have had is gone, all safety you had as a spirit will vanish, and I can no longer guarantee your survival." Koloki swallowed heavily. Mannichi grinned wickedly and said, "I've been there before. It's fun!"

They stepped through the gate to the world of chaos that the five races called home, and Koloki Takasan's life was forever changed. For better or worse, not a soul in Kamigawa could say.


	3. Flight of the Arrow

Tarlok and his new apprentice, whose name he soon found to be Metaiho (or Metai for short), set out on their quest; one of them with an eager heart ready to see the world as it truly was, the other hiding from the horrors of life in a tattered hood. The weather was fair, the food abounded by them as they walked, and there was little in the way of obstacles on the path, save for a couple fallen trees. Where there should have been peace in the assassin's heart though, there was turmoil. The turmoil of curiosity, of fear, of knowledge, and of Metai, who would not, despite any effort to make him, stop talking.

"So you killed Hidetsugu?" asked the boy with eyes large as shruikans.

"Yes," answered Tarlok solemnly.

"Was he hard to kill?"

"No."

"But he killed so many before; how did you do it?"

"An arrow in the right place can change a man's life."

Metai was silent for slightly more than a minute, and then the questions persisted. Through the noise, Tarlok heard footsteps crunching over the dry leaves. The smell of charred blood filled the air, and the assassin clapped a hand over the boy's mouth. This resulted in protest, but the lad quickly saw that Tarlok was not doing this out of displeasure. The two of them started up into a tree, but Metai slipped back down and landed in a bush.

Ogres came from the brambles and spoke in their strange tongues that few men could understand. Luckily, the royal assassin to Lord Konda was one of these few. "_The trail stops here, Guntark,"_ said the smaller one, drawing a wickedly sharp, curved blade and twirling it deftly between his fingers.

The larger one, a brutish, scarred giant with war paint thrown in twisted patterns across his face and chest screamed at his comrade, "_I smell it!" _and knocked him over the head, rendering him unconscious. _"I smell Hidetsugu's blood, and I know that his killer is here!"_ As he spoke, more ogres came from within the underbrush and sniffed about their leader, trying to discern where the scent was coming from.

Before long, they began to smell around the bush where Metai was hiding, and Tarlok drew his bow. Before he loosed the shot though, Metai emerged with his hunting knife, slashing at the ogre but hitting only air. The beasts laughed at him and scooped him up, dangling him in the air by one scrawny ankle. "Put me down, put me down!" shouted Metai to no avail. The ogres only laughed more.

_I swear boy, if we live I may have to kill you_, thought Tarlok to himself as the beast named Guntark approached Metai with a knife in hand.

"_I do not think that you are the one who ended my master," _said Guntark, taking the boy in hand and holding a knife to his throat, "_but perhaps he is close." _He spun about, saying to the underbrush in surprisingly fluent Japanese, "If you wish to see your little friend live, you will show yourself immediately."

Tarlok did not move. Guntark began to move his knife slowly across Metai's neck, walking ever closer to his two minions, who stood behind him grumbling amongst themselves. Tarlok saw his shot, and drew his bow.

"I am going to count to three," continued Guntark, "and if you let me get there then this boy's blood will spill into the dirt."

Tarlok waited for the ogre to get just an inch closer to his allies.

"One,"

Tarlok loosened his grip of the twine of the longbow.

"Two,"

He took a deep breath and silenced the world around him.

"Three,"

A single drop of blood came from Metai's neck, but before it hit the ground Tarlok's arrow sailed true into the ogre's eye, through the other side and into his comrade, through him and into the last standing ogre, through him and into the bark of a tree. Metai fell to the ground, feeling the tiny pinprick of red on his neck and staring into Tarlok's eyes as if the assassin were some warrior god.

Tarlok snapped the neck of the ogre who Guntark had knocked out when they had first arrived in the clearing, and looked about him, thinking _I wish it were always so simple._

"An arrow in the right place," whispered Metai.

"Can change a man's life," finished Tarlok.

The two of them continued down the path, one looking forward to teaching his new apprentice as much as he could, the other no longer sure he wanted to learn.


	4. Rage

Koloki and Mannichi walked down a dirt path, the weight of his own body slowing the young boy down. His new form was displeasing to the eye, a brown, goblin like creature with a heavy stone shell and several small plates of sheetrock orbiting him slowly. They should have impaired his vision, but for some reason he could see through them. Around his waist a cloth made his belt, and from there dangled Uzewama's Jitte.

"Where are we going?" asked Koloki quietly.

"You'll know when we get there," answered Mannichi, looking into the sun. Koloki had never seen the great star so close, and determined that things must be even stranger in this human universe than he had anticipated.

Into a large dojo they walked, hundreds of men around them gazing in awe. Koloki wondered if they had ever seen a spirit before. As they exited the complex and began to head for the forest, a group of men in masked white uniforms with red ornaments approached them with swords slung over their shoulders.

"Let us into this wood," said Mannichi, taking a stand by Koloki so as to defend the boy.

Half the warriors drew swords while the others readied their bows. The men prepared to hold the line as their leader came forth and said, "I am Kumano, Master Yamabushi, fighter of spirits, giver of eternal sleep." He sighed and continued. "My men and I have been through much in the past months, keeping your kind from reaching the sacred forest." His men advanced so that they were again at his side. "If you return to the spirit world now, and forget whatever errand you are on, I will permit you to live." He took from his belt a long scepter that glowed with magic. "But if you attempt to get past me, your fate will be sealed."

Mannichi just laughed along all the while. Koloki silently prayed that his confidence was well deserved as his elder comrade said in a voice that did not waiver, "We are not here to negotiate, only to win this war, once and for all."

"Then we will kill you, and ensure our own victory," muttered Kumano, but the blood red spirit was already upon his men, morphing his form to slide through the tiniest cuts and smallest openings in the mortal's bodies, manipulating them from the inside to fight for him.

"Fight Koloki, do not just watch me!" screamed Mannichi angrily, but as he did, Kumano reached out with his scepter and held the furious spirit in the air. Mannichi's face quickly turned from one of bloodlust and hatred to fear and worry. Koloki was unmoving, paralyzed with fear as a bright red light began to glow from his escort. It was driving Mannichi towards the endless sleep, he knew, a ritual that could be used to destroy even the most powerful of spirits in less than a minute.

Koloki panicked and ran towards the chanting shaman, who pushed him into the dirt as he laughed, "Filthy genju." In a flash of horrifying images, Koloki saw every moment that he had been pushed down, thrown around, beaten into a wall, tortured, mocked, ridiculed, and hated in his entire life. From the cesspool of sadness that he called existence these memories rose up to create an emotion that he had never before felt. He had accepted that he was inferior to other spirits his entire life, and so had never felt the need to experience the emotion that flowed through his veins and cracked his stone body until now. He felt rage, and it was beautiful.

The stones floating about him dropped down and his form crumbled, giving way to a powerful being of pure energy that now stood before the astounded warriors. Koloki turned to Mannichi, who was quickly fading into eternal oblivion, and raised his hand in one swift motion. With his hand came a spray of dirt that blinded the shaman briefly. As Kumano's men came to fight Koloki, he shifted his foot in a great arc, and in response the miles of dirt beneath them became mud, dropping the men to the heart of their world. Kumano stumbled back into a tree, and with movements of the hands that looked as if he were playing the delicate lyre itself, the wood of the tree bent to pin the human to its bark.

Koloki approached the wheezing shaman and said, "Genju indeed," as he controlled a burst of energy that tore his enemy from the fabric of existence itself, resigning him permanently to the Aether.

The stones that had covered Koloki's form now returned to him, but this time he was a smooth, solid, tall humanoid instead of some Akki-like monstrosity. At his heart glowed a dim light, the only thing that could be seen of his god-like power. He looked to his master, who gazed about him and muttered, "Well done."

Koloki's vision rocked, and he knelt onto the dirt. Mannichi leapt to his side, but too late. The genju of the realm, exhausted from his own demonstration of power, had fallen unconscious.


	5. A Bond Across Infinity

Tarlok and Metai sat by a good sized campfire, trading stories of their travels, which made the elder roll his eyes and wish his life were so easy, while the younger wondered how long it would be before such acts of heroism as the assassin had performed would fade into myth.

"Can I show you something?" asked Tarlok.

"I don't see why not," answered Metai, drinking soup from his wooden bowl.

Tarlok settled down into the log that he was sitting on and concentrated every emotion that he could muster on the tiny space between his hands. Slowly, spastically, a shower of sparks erupted between his palms and rained its tiny storm of life and death onto the wet stone beneath him. He then reeled back, exhausted from the effort.

Metai laughed a giddy laugh, clutching his abdomen and pointing a mocking finger at the

assassin, which is generally not a thing to point a mocking finger at. Tarlok blushed furiously, although he did not know why, and asked the boy why he was laughing.

"You call that magic?" responded Metai, drying tears from his eyes and breathing spastically. "I've seen lightning bugs make bigger sparks than you!" Tarlok seriously considered sending the boy home to Konda in pieces.

"Well look at you, the boy who nearly got killed by an ogre today, mocking me, the man

who saved you." Metai's smile faded to shame. Tarlok paused for a moment, then kept up the storm of rage that he had been keeping inside for ten long years now. "You have no idea what I am, who I could be, what hell I've seen and demons I've killed. You are a student of my lord for reasons that I can not fathom, for I see into you, through you, past what you claim to be. I knew from the moment I saw you that you were stuck up scum, not worthy of Konda's training and certainly not worthy of mine." Although in his raging state he could not have noticed, Metai's hands began to pulse with an aura fueled glow, and he winced. "You are a nothing," spat Tarlok menacingly, "a speck of dust, a pawn in a game of kings. Why you follow me, why you hunger for this endless nightmare of a life that I put myself through for my master, I do not understand."

The assassin lowered his roaring voice to a whisper as he leaned in close to the young man and uttered through clenched teeth, "Why?"

Metai's form glowed and shook, and stones from the earth engulfed his entire being, smoothing into a. A pale light came from within his heart and he reared back to strike Tarlok, screeching, "I don't know!" in a voice far too deep and wise to be his. From Metai's hands came a torrent of flame that Tarlok barely had time to dodge. Tarlok reached into his belt and drew Tatsenuma, and as the next blast of fire came he held the blade firmly in front of him. The fires split at the sword's edge, passing harmlessly about him as he knew they would. When the dense light cleared though, Metai's heavy form was upon him, driving a powerful fist into his stomach and sending him flying back.

Tarlok landed hard against a tree and fell ten feet to the ground. Tatsenuma fell next to

him, glinting in the moonlight. "Metai!" yelled Tarlok at the boy, who was now a humanoid statue-like creature of about six feet in height. "Metai, do not make me hurt you!" but the kami that had replaced Konda's student did not listen, only ran to him faster than any man or beast should have been able to and threw him back to the campfire, where the man was barely able to avoid falling into the still raging pit of flame.

He found the blade, and when next Metai ran at him he ducked beneath the spirit's

grasping arms, driving Tatsenuma through his middle and separating him into two parts, which thudded on the ground next to each other. A long, granite spine reached from the part that had been Metai's bottom and seemed to plug into Metai's top, drawing the two of them back together. A bright, hot, orange light made its way about the thing's waist, fusing the two halves into one again.

No sooner had Tarlok turned about to face his opponent than he was pummeled against

a tree, the bark cracking under the weight of his impact. Metai's forearm came against his neck, forcing the man to drop his weapon and claw against the stone member for air.

"Metai," screamed Tarlok through the pain, "this is madness."

The boy's force only increased.

"Metai stop!"

More, crushing pain, and the assassin could no longer speak. One thought made its way

through his mind as he drifted into oblivion though. _I'm sorry_, thought Tarlok. Never had he been brought so low. Never had a samurai forsaken his honor to bring about peace. Always had the warriors of Lord Konda found a way through blood and toil and flame to solve their problems, but never did they negotiate. Always victory, never second chances. This was the creed of Konda's samurai.

The stones that crushed Tarlok relaxed, and he fell to the ground, gasping for air. He

reached for his blade, turning hazily to face his attacker with murder in his eyes, but in the eyes of that monster he saw the boy that he had saved from ogres earlier on that same day, the hunger for learning and adventure, and none of the savage furor that had tried to destroy him only moments ago.

Tarlok regained his composure as he said in a voice that lacked comprehension,

"Metai?"

Metai looked at him, responding to his name, and fell to the floor with a heavy thud.

Tarlok could not understand these matters from another world, but he carefully approached his friend, and did what he could to make the boy comfortable as he slept.


End file.
